I wish I had a good story to tell about this one.

I don’t.

Apparently, I don’t have a good story because I am a historian and not a filmmaker.  Here’s the deal:  filmmakers often tell good stories.  Historians often don’t.

Is this news to you?

Bond films, of course, intrigue so many people because they tell good stories.  The typical Bond film often sports some sort of wild, unpredictable action scene toward the beginning, runs through plenty of twists and turns in the plot, and packs in dramatic action at the end.  The filmmakers use appealing narrative and visual tropes: technological gadgets, life-threatening explosions, clever villains, sex appeal, and cars that do things like turn into submarines.  The action often takes place in some sort of exotic and alluring setting.  James Bond is not only cool, he comes with his own background music.

Meanwhile, I have heard plenty of people complain about history teachers who make their students memorize dates.  And academic historians write books that are set up like long legal arguments, complete with professional jargon.  Who reads these things?

(Actually, other historians do.  Does that make us boring people?)

Now, there are very good reasons why academic historians write books that are set up as long arguments, supported by evidence that is meticulously detailed in footnotes.  Histories make claims about the past, and in order to be accurate about those claims, they need to be grounded in the evidence.

But some academic historians have wondered whether we have lost something by ignoring the power of stories and good writing.  Would more people see the significance of history if historians wrote better stories?

I’m not talking about Abraham Lincoln the Vampire Slayer.  I don’t mean that history should be simply be another form of entertainment. And I firmly believe that historians need to write long arguments with detailed evidence, even if these historical works are only read by other historians.

But I also suspect that there are important truths about the past that are best told in story form.  The Apostle Paul may have written theological arguments, but the Gospels are told in story form.

Samuel Sharpe’s rebellion would make a great story.  And a great movie.  Because of the lack of evidence, it would involve making speculation, but that speculation could be grounded in the best available scholarship.  And it would be a great counterpart to the film, “Amazing Grace.”  Admirable as he was as an individual, William Wilberforce does not encompass the entire story of the abolition of slavery.  But for now, all we really have are the historical arguments about Sharpe and the rebellion in Jamaica.

It is a hard to tell a good story AND hold true to the evidence.  But I think historians ought to try to do it more often.

That’s my argument.  I wish I could have told it in story form.

Bond wins this one.

Score:

James Bond                3

Samuel Sharpe            4